


A Game of Their Own

by DelilahBlueEyes



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Dark!Belle, F/M, Smut, dark apprentice - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-03-03
Updated: 2015-08-03
Packaged: 2017-12-04 03:38:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 18,672
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/706095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DelilahBlueEyes/pseuds/DelilahBlueEyes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After months of teasing and toying Rumpelstiltskin finally makes a move on his lovely apprentice. It all begins with a potion.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was super fun to write! More to follow.

“And that is the last stage of this particular potion. The others will have to simmer for a while longer yet. The glowing timers will notify you when they are to be cooled and bottled.”

“Fascinating.”

Rumpelstiltskin spun slowly on his heel to spot his apprentice sprawled across an empty worktable before the tall tower window, leaning back on on her hands and her legs crossed, one foot swinging carelessly. He allowed his eyes to flick over her while she was busy staring out at the mountains, letting his gaze linger on the skin revealed by the slit in her skirt and her breasts pressed up to great advantage. 

“Oh, why so impertinent, little one?” She hated it when he called her that, all the more reason for him to do so. “Is there something you’d rather be out and about doing? Perhaps a handsome young lad down in the village expecting your…. attentions?”

“Oh, you’re very funny,” She drawled in response, sitting up straighter and drawing one blood red lacquered fingernail over the milky skin of her exposed thigh. “But at least I could go down to the village and pick out a handsome young man to receive my attentions. You probably could as well, but not without a sizable pile of that gold you’re always spinning.”

He made a face somewhere between a grimace and a grin. “Then it’s well that I don’t look for any young men to warm my bed.”

He turned back to the bench and snatched up a small glass vial waiting there, plucking the stopper from it as he strode across the room. He stopped only when his thighs brushed her knees, offering the little container to her with a flourish.

“Now, drink this down, dearie,” he demanded, pleased when her hand lifted to accept the vial from him, her smooth fingers running along his briefly.

“What is it?”

“Well I’d hope you know it’s a potion by now. Months you’ve been my apprentice, you ought to have at least gotten that through your thick skull.”

“I know it’s a potion,” she snapped and he tittered delightedly. “I mean what does it do?”

He tipped his head to the side with a quirk of his lips, placing the tips of his fingers together before his chest. “It should do exactly what it is intended to do and nothing more and nothing less. An experiment I've been working on, let's say.”

"Should? What do you mean should?" She held the glass up to the light filtering in through the window, peering through it warily as though expecting to find a tiny skull and crossbones floating in the viscous liquid. 

“Well, there’s always the possibility that we missed a crucial step during the brewing, or perhaps that you added a pinch too much of ground asphodel when I sent you to check them this morning.” He shrugged, not even attempting to hide his grin at the flash of suspicion on her features.

“If you’re trying to poison me, Rumplestiltskin…” She trailed off when he laughed at her, visibly steeling herself before tilting her head back and downing the entire vial in one gulp. When she lifted her eyes again and caught him staring at the pale column of her neck, she smiled and flicked her tongue out over her bottom lip. “Tastes like strawberries.”

He made a noncommittal noise as his pupils expanded and darkened briefly. He leaned slightly forward, moving into her personal space as he studied her intensely with his reptilian eyes. The air between them seemed to gather the heat of their mingled breaths in the few moments before his gaze faltered and he whirled away and crossed the room. “Now, off with you. I’ve matters to see to other than your entertainment. Go and occupy yourself.”

She bounded out of the room with a grin, knowing exactly the reason he’d turned his back to her so quick. He’d looked like he’d like to draw blood the way he’d stared at her mouth. It was a little game they’d been playing for a while. She would drop a piece of parchment so that she had to bend low to retrieve it or moan aloud while she ate her desert, the sound echoing almost as loudly as his teeth grinding in response. He in turn would glide his roughened hand along the silky wood of his spinning wheel as they sat in the evening, every once in a while scratching his nails over it while she sat entranced in the armchair by the fire, pretending to read her book. It was a contest. A never-ending challenge of who could make whom the most uncomfortably aroused without it being entirely obvious, all without ever acknowledging what was happening.

As she strolled about she decided that she’d like to sit in the massive library for a while and read. Whatever effect the potion would have, it would likely be a mild irritation and if her feet were soon to become an extra pair of hands, she'd rather already be sitting when they did. And if her master happened to find her napping on the chaise lounge with her dress drawn innocently up about her knees, well, that would certainly not be her doing. But soon after she’d settled herself in her favorite little reading spot, she found herself slipping off her painfully pointed high heeled boots and her stockings, the sun seeming to have warned the air more than usual on that particular spring morning. It was after only four more pages and the introduction of a particularly angry dragon into the story that she found herself unable to focus once more. She lifted her mass of curls off her neck and stood, going to the window to push it open with a shaking hand. The slight breeze that met her mysteriously overheated skin did little to relieve her discomfort and she leaned forward over the windowsill, dropping her head forward and resting her weight on her hands on the cool marble.

“Oh, dearie, dear, dear. You seem to be in a spot of trouble, little one.” The cheerful voice behind her made her sigh. Of course.

“You know, if you’ve poisoned me with anything slow acting you’re a complete idiot. I’ve picked up more than a few unpleasant curses from my teas with the queen.” Her breath shuddered out of her when a single clawed finger ghosted a trail down her back, moving seamlessly from bare skin to the fabric of her dress. 

“Now, why would I knowingly poison such a capable and witty little thing?” His voice dropped to a harsh murmur as his finger made the return trip, from dress to skin and finally resting at the top of her spine. “Really, it was enough work to find you in the first place without having to train an incompetent replacement after your demise.”

“I do believe that’s the first time you’ve ever called me—“ she broke off with a gasp as his sharp nail scratched across her shoulder blade, leaving a line of fire behind it. “C-competent.”

“Oh, dearie. You know very well that I would have had you out by the end of your first day had you not shown a certain…. Aptitude for magic, shall we say?” The hand not tracing nonsensical patterns across her back slipped around her waist, curling warm and firm against the whalebone corset digging into her ribs. “But I would never have it said that I coddled my apprentice. Oh, no. You had to earn your good treatment and believe me, you did, little one.”

“You can’t call me little one and be touching me the way you are,” she groaned as the hand at her waist slipped forward to her stomach and the finger at her back turned into two stroking the fine hairs at the nape of her neck until they stood up straight and gooseflesh appeared. 

“Oh, can’t I? Drat.” With a small tug of the hand before her he urged her to stand straight, caught between his body and the open window. “I suppose I’ll have to find another demeaning pet name for you later. I’m somewhat busy at the moment.” 

Slowly but surely, the distance between them shrank until there wasn’t a whisper of air between his chest and her back. The heat radiating through their clothes made Belle feel like she was sweltering in her heavy skirt, leaving her panting quietly as he dragged one hand over her collarbone. He turned his face into her hair and his breath flooding her scalp only made her hotter.

“So this was your plan all along. Your experiment.” She wasn’t asking, although she couldn’t seem to put any venom or accusation in her voice, especially as his mouth had dropped to hover just above the sensitive skin of her exposed shoulder and his lips were searing her in what she was sure was the perfect shape of his smirk.

“It may perhaps have a few minor side effects.” His tongue darted out between slightly parted lips to taste the skin below his mouth and Belle’s knees shook.

“Let me guess. The heat will cease only after... certain activities? Does it serve any purpose besides arousing your poor, defenseless apprentice?” She joked, her hand slipping into his hair even as he stiffened behind her.

“I hadn’t thought—That is, I should have known…” He suddenly sounded so serious and she couldn’t understand why because his hand on her stomach had been ever so slowly inching it’s way downward to where she desperately wanted it. Damn it, if he was only teasing her she’d actually kill him. “If you would not do this, if you would turn back and continue our more professional relationship I won’t begrudge you that.”

She went nearly cross-eyed when another small vial appeared just under her nose, this time filled with a liquid tinged so slightly green that it appeared almost clear in the sunlight. It was held between two trembling, green-scaled fingers. She could almost picture the anxious look that was hovering just over her shoulder, the way he was peering at her like she could crumble him to dust beneath her foot if she liked. She’d only seen him wear that look once, completely by chance. She’d happened to be exploring the West wing when she'd found a door on her right curiously open. Inside, on his knees in the thick, oily dust before a brass studded chest, was her master. His hands had lifted from the box, cradling between them a length of coarse brown fabric that may have been a shawl or a scrap from one of his more inventive disguises if it weren't for the haunted look in his eyes. As he’d raised his head and his wild hair had fallen back, she’d seen that same look on his face. Then he’d noticed her standing just across the room. He’d vanished the box then, forced a grin and made some offhand comment about spring-cleaning.

The contrast of the pure looking liquid against his dark, clawed hand made her feel strangely like Persephone faced with the perfectly ripe, red fruit that damned her to spending half of every year in the underworld with Hades. Then again, who ever said she hadn’t known what she was doing in the first place? Or that she’d regretted it since? But she’d waited too long in answering and he was drawing away from her, preparing to avoid her for as long as it would take for him to salvage his dignity and be able to face her again. Well, she wouldn’t have that.

She reached up and clutched his wrist to keep him close when he would have stepped away, giving her space that she did not want. She plucked the vial from his grip and sent the tiny container sailing through the open window, watching it disappear into the wildly unkempt grass below. It would be a task to find it later but it didn’t matter. The point was for him to see that she would rather throw it away from herself than drink it.

“Don’t think you’re getting out of seeing to me so easily,” she purred as she pressed herself back against him, feeling quite plainly the excitement he’d kept concealed from her before. “You started this and you will see it through. If you even think about taking your hands off me again I’ll punish you.”

For a breathless moment she believed he had truly changed his mind until he plastered himself against her back and his hands pressed her more firmly against him and his hot breath was in her ear as he whispered, “Pushy little thing.”

In the blink of an eye, she was seated on the large polished oak table in the center of the library, her arms clutching at the man standing between her legs in reflexive surprise. For months he’d been doing his best to startle her whenever he could, snatching her up from the kitchen when she was making tea once and depositing her in the center of the busiest marketplace in Agrabah, giggling at her when she promptly threw up in the nearest decorative vase. She still wasn’t quite used to the stomach churning feeling of having the earth disappear from beneath her feet. It made her sick half the time, especially when he insisted on taking her over seas to help him terrorize blinded princes or princesses whose hair had fallen out after taking hokey potions peddled by amateurs.

“It’s nice to see this isn’t the way to special treatment, as you’re as much a bastard as ever.” She pulled him to her by his hair and their mouths hovered mere inches apart. “Although if it was, I’d have been glad to use it as a first resort.”

She could feel his laughter puffing against her lips so she pulled his lower lip into her mouth and bit it sharply until the laugh turned into a groan. He pulled her toward the edge of the table with both hands, stepping forward so that the lower halves of their bodies came into contact. Belle dropped her head back with a gasp, dragging air through already swollen lips as she stared up into his dark as pitch eyes. He pressed his hips forward, slowly grinding his hardness against her as he held her eyes. She stayed still as long as she could, one final defiance offered in the face of his aggravatingly inconsistent arrogance. When she couldn’t stand the friction of him rubbing against her through her skirts any longer she leaned forward and sank her teeth deep into the skin of his throat, feeling the vibration of his answering howl. With a growl he pushed her back onto the table, sliding his hands up over the damask patterned fabric of her bodice until he cupped a breast in each hand, squeezing gently and running his thumbs firmly over her nipples. It was an entirely frustrating sensation as only hints of what he did could be felt and she occupied herself by flexing her fingers and popping the buttons off his vest so that it hung open over his fine linen shirt. With eager hands, she pushed the fabric aside until she could reach his chest and raked her nails gently over his left nipple, relishing the shudder that wracked his frame. 

“How did we go months without really touching each other?” She asked as the ties at her back loosened enough for the entire bodice to be wrenched away from her with three quick tugs.

“Because we’re both too bloody stubborn for our own good,” he growled, leaning forward on his elbows on either side of her to lick along her neck with one long swipe of his tongue. “By all the gods, you taste wonderful.” 

Instead of answering, she clenched her eyes tight shut to ignore the attention he was giving her breasts and fought to discipline her mind. She just had to focus long enough to remember the incantation and…

“What the hell?” She couldn’t help grinning as a very bewildered sorcerer jerked away from where he’d been busy laving the space between her breasts and looked between her face and his suddenly bare lower body. 

“I did some extracurricular reading while you were away last week. All about how to transport objects from one spot to another.” His surprise had turned quickly into something closer to pride as she spoke. “I thought some practical experience would be just the thing. Though your pants may be hung over a candle sconce somewhere on the third floor as you were distracting me.”

With a chuckle he bent down to press a kiss to her lips. “That’s my girl.” 

The tenderness in his eyes was not the thing she wanted to see at the moment so she kicked up her legs to wrap around his waist and pull him tight against her. It reminded him of his earlier intention quite effectively. With a few grunted words, half smothered against her skin as he made a determined effort to make her a necklace of bruises and bite marks, her dress melted into the air. Her shift and his shirt soon followed until they were both stark naked at last. Then the damned man hesitated again! He lifted himself away from her, resting his weight on his forearms to look down at her with the question in his eyes again, do you want this?

Admirable as his concern was, it irked her somewhat to be doubted so. She knew her own mind, and she knew her body. With an unwavering resolve, she slipped a hand down between them until she found his cock, tugging him toward her with the arm about his shoulders until he subsided and moved closer, allowing her to guide him into her body in one smooth motion.

“Now do you believe that I want you?” she whispered as he groaned softly, dropping his forehead to rest against hers. She wrapped every limb around him and rocked her hips slightly forward. “Because I can keep trying to convince you but it’ll be more fun if you just accept it.” 

“You know, it astounds me that you can put together a full sentence,” he ground out, holding himself in check with visible effort. “I can hardly see straight.”

“Well,” she breathed against his ear. “What are you waiting for, then?”

It was all the permission he needed to pull his hips back and cant them forward again, dragging a moan from each of them. He repeated the motion, then again. As she instructed him to thrust harder, as his pace increased, she began to slip backward over the mirror smooth surface of the table. Instead of tugging her back toward him he followed, crawling up after her. 

“Gods, Belle,” he groaned, one hand tugging at the roots of her hair while the other was wrapped tight about her waist to keep her close.

With a flurry of quick, concise movements, she’d reversed their positions so that she straddled him as he lay on the table, staring up at her in surprise. “Yes, Rumpelstiltskin?” she asked sweetly as she clenched around him. 

He growled and shunted up into her and didn’t speak again. Belle was quick to lift herself away from him, leaning forward to balance herself on his chest. His hands went to her hips, massaging the sleek muscles there and digging the tips of his pointed fingernails into her skin as she dropped down again, resting briefly there and grinding against the base of him. Following the urging of his hands, she lifted herself again, dropped again, moving faster with each movement until she was breathing hard and whimpering on every breath. She could feel it, the delicious hot clenching just below her navel that promised something wonderful but she wasn’t close enough to it yet. He seemed to know it from the way he yanked her down against his chest and angled her hips so that every thrust brushed fire along her clit.

“Now,” he breathed harshly into her ear as she clutched at his shoulders and dropped her head with a moan. “Be a good little apprentice and come for your master.”

In any other situation she may have protested the use of the titles, but now it was just the push she needed to latch her teeth into his skin with a high keen, her entire body clenching up as her orgasm washed over her. He followed her not long after while she smoothed her lips over the marks she’d left on the rough hide of his shoulder, enjoying the buzz it created against her sensitized skin. He slammed his head back into the thick oak table with a crack and gritted his teeth around an animalistic snarl that vibrated through her, making her shiver with aftershock. His hands closed about her ass in such a crushing grip that she felt the pinpricks of his nails digging into her skin and gasped, tightening around him again. He released his hold immediately but did not move his hands, instead smoothing them over the curve of her rear as his body went lax. 

She slid her hand under his head, cradling what was sure to be a tender skull in her palm and running her nails lightly over his scalp while she watched him. He looked fairly exhausted and relieved and Belle had to wonder how long it had been since he had this kind of release. She’d joked before about paying for sex, but she hadn’t thought much about what he would have had to resort to with his appearance and…. manner. There were probably a number of whores who would take one look at him and turn tail, even more who would do only what they’d been paid for, though knowing Rumpelstiltskin’s pride it would rankle him to see any signs of reluctance or disgust. She found that she didn’t pity him no matter how long it had been. He’d known what life The Dark One lived before he took his powers and any discomfort he’d brought on himself must be more than made up for in the riches and power he’d received from his magics. It gratified her in any matter, that he’d have her be the first intimate contact he’d had in any number of years.

Dropping her head onto his chest with a sigh, she licked her lips and said,” I think you nearly popped a hole in my backside just now. I’m assuming that means you enjoyed yourself?”

He chuckled and smoothed his hands over the reddened skin again. “Very much so. I’m quite about to fall asleep where I lay.”

Mmm,” Belle stretched herself out languidly, not missing the stifled sound he made when her movement stirred him where he was still nestled inside her. “Just like a man to fall asleep right after sex. You’ve still got those potions brewing upstairs, if you remember.”

“Of course I remember. Though I believe that’s why I’ve got an apprentice about the place, isn’t it?”

“Ah, even more typical to make the woman fetch and carry for you after sex. Honestly, you were supposed to be different.” She rolled her eyes dramatically, pushing herself up to kneel over him, smirking at the way his eyes seemed magnetized to the sway of her breasts. “Well, are any of them corrosive to the skin?”

“Err, not particularly, though one will change your coloring temporarily.” He eyed her speculatively, clearly wondering if he’d ticked her off enough to cause him bodily harm in his... vulnerable state.

“Well then, no need to find my dress, is there?” She was off the table and prowling across the room to the large double doors before he’d even registered what she said. She could practically feel his eyes tracing over her as she exaggerated the swing of her hips.

“No need to dress ever, if you ask me.” He grumbled, snapping his fingers and laughing outright when a resulting ring of flesh being swatted and an undignified squeal met his ears, echoing through the cavernous room.

Oh, yes, he thought as he placed his hands behind his head and sprawled across the cool wood, he could certainly get used to living this way.


	2. Her Move

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Belle surprises her Master in the library and distracts him to no end.

For a man who generally considered himself to be observant, Rumplestiltskin was always dismayed at how easily his little apprentice could startle him. She could turn a corner in the castle or creep into a room on her little kittenish feet or—or slide her hot little hands along his thighs until she was practically framing his cock, as she was doing now.

“I’m afraid I don’t have time to play this afternoon, little one. Be good and occupy yourself until I’ve finished this reading.” His words ended on a grunt as she dug her perfectly manicured nails into his legs through his pants.

“And here I thought we’d gotten away from that particular endearment. Rumple, dear, you know how I dislike it when you call me that.”

Behind his raised book, he smirked. “Of course I know. It’s why I keep doing it—Watch those, would you!” 

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she cooed, stroking her palms over the soft leather until he found himself wanting to squirm into her touch. “Did that hurt?”

“Well, don’t act so surprised. I am as vulnerable to pokey things as any other. I was once as human as yourself, dearie.” Despite his playful words, his tone became somewhat hesitant. It seemed that he was always slipping between irritating arrogance and crushing insecurity. It was dizzying trying to keep pace with his shifting moods.

“Really? Well, let’s see. You’re warm enough to be a man.” One hand tugged his shirt from his pants and wormed up underneath it to feel his skin while the other moved up to trace his jaw. She smothered a laugh when he raised his book to accommodate her, though he kept his eyes on the page. “You speak like a man. You breathe like a man. You're shaped like a man.”

He turned the page of his book and didn’t respond.

“You have the capabilities of a man,” she purred as she dragged her hands back to his crotch. “You certainly fuck like a man.”

The book dipped then and he met her eyes over the top of the cover, pupils dilated and black as pitch. 

“You feel things like a man, don’t you?” she asked as she ghosted one finger over the bulge struggling to be known in his tight leather trousers. “Yes, I think you do.”

He closed his eyes and clenched his jaw, tightening his grip on his book until his nails pierced the delicate paper. While Belle would normally object to any abuse of a book, she found it intoxicating to watch his head tilt back into the cushion as she made another, firmer pass. His breathing picked up as she settled her palm over him and gave him a squeeze, feeling the solid resistance of his cock pressing back. She laughed as a very human flush appeared in his face, mingling with the shimmering golden hue in the light so that she could almost imagine how he must have appeared before he became The Dark One.

“You certainly receive pleasure like a man.”

His eyes found her again and he leaned forward with one hand reaching for her. “Well, I wouldn’t want to appear selfish.”

She tutted and pressed him back into his chair with a grin. “I know how important your research is to you. Can’t have you falling behind in your work, can we?”

He subsided with a growl, still watching her. She held his eyes as she leaned down over him, only breaking eye contact when she had to look down at the laces of his pants to undo them—with her teeth. The tension from his straining erection made it difficult and his subtle shifting movements did nothing to help. Eventually she got his trousers undone and magicked them down his hips and over his knees, letting them drape over his boots. His cock stood straight up dark and tall and she bit her lip at the sight of it.

“Well, go about your reading. I know my business here.” She smirked when he only tossed the book aside, gesturing for her to continue and pressing his fingertips together before his mouth. “Or watch. As long as you refrain from speaking.”

Her hands found their way to his thighs again, dragging through the hair there, tingling at the rough texture of his skin. She scraped her nails along the sensitive crease at the inside of his hip, drawing a groan and a twitch from him. The groan grew into a shout when she placed a teasing kiss at his weeping head. She closed her eyes as she licked the small spot of precum from her lips, purring at the salty taste. She knew he watched her from the catch in his breath. She knew every sound he made, the experience of more nights spent screwing than sleeping lending her a certain expertise. This sound meant that he wanted to kiss her. Well, that would have to wait.

While she would often taunt and tease him until he finally begged her, she waited now only long enough for him to feel the damp warmth of her breath before taking him into her mouth. He cursed impressively above her and she heard the fabric and wood of the armchair straining under his clenched fingers and had to work not to smile. She worked her way down the shaft, sucking gently until she could fit no more comfortably. He tasted like the spicy soap he used mixed with the lingering scent of leather. She hollowed her cheeks as she withdrew, rewarded with the hiss of air pulled through his teeth. 

She set up a steady pace, one hand twisting gently around the base of him and the other tracing soothing shapes on his stomach. He sighed and groaned by turns, his hands twitching and clenching in turn until she guided them into her hair where they lay against her skull without pulling or directing. When she heard him make a needy little whimper in the back of his throat she picked up her speed, sucking harder and relaxing her throat to take him deeper. Just as his fingers tightened infinitesimally where they were woven into her hair, she suddenly let him slip free of her mouth with a small pop. Pushing her hair back over her shoulders as she sat back, ignoring his disbelieving whine.

“What were you researching, by the way?” she asked brightly. “I thought I recognized the volume but you threw it away before I got a good look at the title. Was it the one about the efficiency of dragon hide in grinding tools? I’ve been meaning to look that up myself. The mortar and pestle in your workroom could stand to be replaced and I think the old Norse trader down in the village could aid us in finding a reliable merchant to see about it. I’d love to experiment with a new dragon hide--,”

“Belle, please!” He growled, tugging slightly on her in an attempt to guide her back down to his lap.

She dropped her cheery façade and glared up at him sternly for a moment. “If I let you cum, you will never call me little one again. Do we have a deal?”

“Yes, yes, fine. Whatever you want. Just _please_!”

She smiled angelically before deigning to place a delicate kiss on his tip, feeling it pulse against her like it was begging her too. “Well, since you asked so prettily.”

She had no mercy now as she pulled him between her lips, bobbing her head quickly over him, pausing occasionally to press him against the roof of her mouth with her tongue and hum quietly. She knew from the way he struggled not to thrust into her mouth and the feral tone of his cries that he was drawing closer. Her free hand moved down between his legs to gently cup his balls. When she felt one of his clawed fingers tap her scalp she looked up to find him staring at her imploringly. She wasn’t sure what he was asking this time, although she knew of his hang up on having her swallow, no matter how many times she assured him that she didn’t mind at all. She simply winked at him and gave another strong pull in answer to his question.

It took less than a handful of seconds of watching him through her lashes, moaning deep in her throat and trying to encourage him to do what came naturally, though he held himself rigid for fear of hurting her. His hands left her hair to clench at the seat cushion to either side of him and she heard fabric tearing just as he grunted and his hips twitched up into her mouth a few times. She swallowed down every rush of warmth that flooded her tongue, wondering whether the earthy taste of him was a result of the curse or some peculiarity of the man himself. When she’d cleaned him of every drop she could find she tucked him back into the loose front of his trousers and watched him fondly while he struggled to catch his breath. 

When he’d spent a few moments recovering he pulled her up onto the chair so that she was straddling him and made a vague motion in the air, pulling a lace handkerchief from nowhere. With the corner of the delicate square he dabbed at the skin around her mouth and she realized what a fright her lipstick must be. She couldn’t help the grin that bloomed on her face as she looked at him. He chuckled and abandoned the task, pulling her toward him until he could kiss her. 

“How about dear one?” He breathed when they parted.

“Hmm. It’s better than some others, I suppose. Though let’s not use that one in mixed company—or any company. Or perhaps at all.” She sighed and raised her arms to smooth her hair back. “Now, back to the important point I was making before you interrupted me. I would really love to get some new equipment in the workroom, not to mention that a few of the tables could stand to be replaced. And really, we should move your spinning wheel away from the entire work area and put it closer to the window. And--,”

“Dearie, I believe that’s quite enough talk of work for now,” he murmured and she was aware of his hands pushing under her skirt to skim over the warm skin of her thighs. “I’ve got a much more interesting idea in mind. After all, I hate to be in anyone’s debt, sexual favors not included.”

“Well,” she sighed, not entirely having to fake her disappointment. She did so love her work. “What exactly did you have in mind, then?”

“You’ll see,” he growled, a wild smile spreading across his face and thank god he was in his confident mood now. She was sure to enjoy it, whatever his plan was.


	3. His Move

“Mmm, good afternoon, apprentice.” 

A familiar, warm pair of hands slid possessively about Belle’s waist and she paused in the act of pouring a beaker of acidic basilisk venom into one holding just a dab of mermaid blood to close her eyes and lean slightly back against the man at her back. He seemed encouraged by that and brushed his nose over her neck, breathing her in. But before he could follow his nose with his lips, she scrunched her face up in concentration and was rewarded with a sharp cry and a rush of air as Rumpelstiltskin leaped away from her.

“What the hell was that?” He demanded and she turned to find him rubbing at his stomach through his waistcoat, looking like a puppy that had been swatted with a shoe. No wonder why either as she’d sent a decently strong jolt of electricity right into the skin below his navel. 

“Not while I’m working,” she told him primly, just managing to keep the smile from her face until her mass of hair was between them again. 

“But I’m the one that set you to working, and I’ve decided that I would be perfectly happy to have you distracted for a time while I—“

“Don’t touch,” she commanded, lifting the newly filled test tube to swirl the strange glowing, bubbling liquid in small circles, watching the substances dissolve and combine into a murky shade of burnt orange. After a count of 35 and it would be ready for the next ingredient.

“Well, fortunately, touching isn’t necessary at all,” he murmured, stepping close again and placing his hands on the worktable to either side of her. He was so close she could hear the whisper of his pant legs . “I bet I could seduce you with words alone. I’d love to try, in fact.”

“Well, anything would be less dull than this potion. Go ahead and try if it’ll amuse you,” she struggled to sound as bored and distracted as she could while inside her heart was beginning to flutter with the anticipation of what he would say.

It was their new game to play as they’d effectively destroyed their last by finally succumbing to their desires. Now it was a battle of self-discipline and temptation that they played. Who had the most capacity to resist? Who took the most convincing? It was deliciously contrary and Belle found herself applauding her opponent after each and every step he took to sway her. It appeared that Rumpelstiltskin had become quite articulate in his time as a dealmaker and she reaped the benefit of that silver-tongue at every opportunity. And oh, what that tongue was capable of. But the point of the game was to keep occupied and stay resolute so she only sighed and clicked one heel against the cobblestones beneath her to convey her annoyance.

“Well, where to begin? There are so many ways we have yet to try, so many new and… acrobatic positions still unfamiliar to us. Of course I think about it half the day and find myself not getting a thing done but how can I help myself when I have the sweet memory of you in my head?” His voice was low now, her impish master, lower than she’d heard it ever before. The gravelly tone it took on made her long to press against him and feel it rumble through her. “Your pert little nipples pressing against my chest, your pretty eyes rolling when you’re in the throes, the little noises you make when I bite you. You’re intoxicating, little apprentice.”

“Why, thank you,” she purred, managing to pour the contents of the beaker into the small bowl hovering over a heating charm beside the pestle and mortar and busying her hands by preparing the next steps of the potion.

“You’re quite welcome.” His small laugh gusted warm breath against the nape of her neck but she remained as still and silent as possible. “Now if only I could find a way to keep you from my mind for more than a few hours at a time. Or a way to keep you near enough that I could just reach out and have you whenever the mood takes me. And I assure you, it does. You’ve no idea how many times I’ve been in my records room, going over the contract of a deal and happened to remember the softness of your hair between my fingers or your lips wrapped around my cock. I get harder than steel faster than I’d thought possible and yet you’re nowhere to be found. Ofttimes I take myself in hand thinking of you and it always leaves me feeling a bit... hmm, unsatisfied.” 

Belle shuddered at the image of him sitting at his heavy oaken desk, one hand fisted on the desktop as he pumped himself hard. She could picture it so clearly that she wondered for a moment whether she’d had some help with the visual.

“But imagine if I brought you with me one day, locked the door and stripped you of all but your thin cotton shift. I could keep you on my lap while I worked, bring a book to keep you entertained while I do my boring tasks. Then an idea would strike me, some new way for us to fit together or a new…” He paused to ghost his nose over her hair. “sensation to experiment with and lo, there you would be. Imagine how many things we could learn, how much we could try if we had hours upon hours of practice.”

She laughed and it was breathier than she’d like. “You would try to make sex more efficient wouldn’t you?”

“I would have you wrapped around me, hot and tight for hours on end, stopping only to rehydrate or when you finally pled exhaustion.” He hummed against her ear and she couldn’t help shuddering again. “And have no doubts that you would be exhausted, Belle. I would fuck you as many times and as thoroughly as you would allow me, until we were both unable to do more than lift a finger to magic ourselves to bed.”

Belle had to scramble to take her nearly forgotten potion back off the heat spell, nearly singeing her fingertips in the process as he chuckled at her back. She firmly ignored the tingling sensation that was working it’s way up over her ribs to hone in on her nipples. She’d never told him he couldn’t use magic. Her hands shook alarmingly as she poured the finished potion into a vial and stoppered it. She set it down carefully as far from the edge of the table as she could reach before dropping her head and bracing herself on her hands as a single ghostly finger slipped between her folds and pressed teasingly against her clit. She could feel Rumplestiltskin standing silently and solidly at her back, watching her tremble with a palpable smugness which would have otherwise infuriated her. Between the alternating tugging and nipping at her breasts and the hot pressure of the invisible hand between her legs, she found herself entirely willing to concede the game for the time being.

She turned and threw herself at him with a strangled groan and was caught up in his arms as eagerly as ever. Though he’d not given up wondering at the fact that she wanted him, Rumplestiltskin was quick to take advantage of any contact she would willingly give. It found them each crushing the other against their body, breathing like all the air had gone out of the room. Belle was glad to find him as undone by his little word play as she was as she pressed her hips against his. He growled and lifted her clear off the ground, encouraging her to wrap her legs around his waist as he staggered to the rough stone wall and leaned her against it. Belle trailed her mouth down his throat, kisses quickly turning into stinging bites that drove him to thrust against her through their clothing.

“I swear by all that is holy, if you don’t take off your pants and make good on all your filthy suggestions right now, I will— _yes_!” she shrieked as both his ungodly tight leather pants and her skirt and underthings disappeared into thin air and he plunged into her in one smooth stroke. She pushed her hands into the wide neck of his shirt and dug her fingers into his thick skin, drawing a hiss and a hard thrust in response.

“Now, isn’t that better?” he panted, setting up a hard but slow pace and gritting his teeth to stay in control. “Right where we both wanted to be.”

Belle was having none of that. If she was done trying to win this round, so should he be. So she clenched tight around him until he growled and slapped an open palm against the stone beside her head. “Shut up and fuck me!”

He obliged without a second thought, slipping both hands under her to pull her into every punishing thrust as he sucked at her lower lip. She made no attempt to quiet herself, wrapping her legs tight about him and giving back everything she got. The unforgiving stone of the wall bit into her skin where her dress cut low across her back and it only amplified the quickly building pleasure in her stomach. She slipped one hand down around him to grip his backside through his trousers and feel the muscles flexing with every harsh thrust. When he made to lean away and watch her—he did that sometimes when he was feeling particularly good about himself—she jerked him back against her and clenched her inner muscles as tight as she could, receiving a muffled curse and an instinctual twitch of his hips in response. 

“Fuck! You little-“

She cut him off with a brutal kiss, feeling the buzz of their mingled moans against her lips as he shoved himself deeper, pulling her hips as tight as he could, tilting her pelvis forward so he could pound into her so hard she was sure she would have slid up the wall from the force of it were he not holding her so tightly. It didn’t take much more to send the fire burning in her stomach surging through her as she careened into an orgasm so intense that her vision whited out for a moment or two. She dug her nails tight into his skin until she felt hot blood welling up around them, not relenting until she felt him grit his teeth against her ear and push into her a few more times, his pace stuttering as he finished. 

Of course, not a minute after he’d given her a mindblowing orgasm, he was back to his usual falsely swaggering self.

“Well, that was certainly worth all the trouble, I think. Though it wasn’t nearly as much effort as I’d expected to have to put into it.”

She hummed quietly as she brought a hand around from behind him, painting his cheek with his own blood before meticulously licking each nail clean like a cat, ending by licking up the little stripe of blood she’d left on his skin. He was panting and clutching her hard enough to bruise. 

“You were saying?” She drawled, giving his lower lip a little flick with the tip of her tongue with a saucy grin. She loved to tease him like this. It was always fun to try to beat her record and see how quick she could get him hard again.

“I suppose I should have been saying that I’m lucky to have such a little vixen in my home but I’m known to dance around the point a bit, aren’t I?”

Belle nodded solemnly before pressing a last kiss on his lips and pushing him away. 

“Unlike a certain lazy sorcerer, I have work to do. Unless you want an angry harpy beating down your castle door for not having her potions ready for delivery.”

“Odd, I don’t remember making any arrangements with Her Majesty. But a queen must keep her illusions up somehow. Must take quite the parade of potions and creams to stay as…. fresh as Regina does.” 

Her musical laugh as he did up his trousers and strolled out of the tower was the perfect end to the little encounter to Rumpelstiltskin’s mind. Now, despite what she’d said, it was off to work to prod that idiot prince Charming back into the arms of his true love. Honestly, he put more work into the relationship than either of the two of them did. ‘I will always find you’ his bollocks. Clearly he’d need to give the lad a magically unerring compass and a boot to the backside to get him back on track. It would seem they were making their princes from inferior stuff these days.


	4. His Revelation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Belle decides to play a little game, Rumple is overjoyed to follow her lead. But something is wrong.

“Hello?” The feeble voice echoed up the main stairs of the castle to its master’s sensitive ears and he grinned a wide, ferocious smile. The figure he found waiting in his front hall was delightfully petite and timid looking. He flicked his fingers at the enormous front doors, which slammed shut with a resounding crash. The poor creature screamed and whirled about in fright as he giggled. He took her in from the toes of her dainty little slippers to the finely woven hood of her cream colored cloak. Her dress beneath was simple white linen and the handle of a little brown basket was clenched in her hands. The folds of her cloak did little to hide her curvy body from his gaze and he took his time admiring them.

“What are you doing in my castle,” he drawled, having allowed his eyes to linger on her form long enough. Now it was time to see the fear in her eyes. “deari— _ee?_ ”

As she pushed back her hood and shook her hair gently to fluff out her mass of luscious brown curls, the mighty Dark One found himself gaping like a fish. Belle?! He watched her perform a wavering little curtsy and look up at him through her lashes, the fear he expected to see plain on her face. 

“R-Rumpelstiltskin, I’ve come to ask for your help.” She spoke quietly to the marble floor, hands twisting nervously about the handle of her basket. When she glanced up at him again a flash of mischief cleared all of his confusion. “Help me, Dark One, please.”

Ah, it appeared they were going to play a game. How delightful. He strode closer, walking around the other side of the table and giggling again when she turned to keep him in front of her. Her cloak whispered around her ankles as she began to back away slowly, her blue eyes wide in her pale face. 

“And what do you need my help with, dearie? An undesired match with a dimwitted beau? An evil stepmother harking at you day and night, perhaps? What service could I offer you?” He performed a jaunty little bow before bringing his hands up to his chest, fingertips steepled before his hydraskin vest as he watched her swallow visibly and gather the courage to speak. 

“My name is Belle French. The queen’s soldiers are raiding the villages along my father’s borders. The queen has decreed that my father must gift his castle to her as the summer breeze off the ocean is soothing and she wishes to have it for a leisure home.” She shifted her weight from foot to foot, little slippered feet making quiet tapping noises on the stone beneath her. “He refused to do as she commanded and now she plans to take it by force. She will lay waste to our kingdom.”

He watched her for a few moments longer, unable to hide his delight as he finally shrugged and strolled around her. “And, ah, what do you believe a lowly magician can do against the queen and her army?” 

“Well, you’re the Dark One. Y- you have magic. You…help people?”  
He cackled in response to her words and the thinly masked hesitation behind them. She flinched away from the sound and dropped her eyes to the floor again. Oh, what a stunning little actress. And what a gift that this was how she would choose to spend any given day with her stuffy old master. He circled closer, herding her away from the front doors and any route of escape.

“Come now, dearie, surely if you’ve heard of the Dark One,” he paused to throw a hand up in a flourish and a wink and saw her dip her head further to hide her sudden smile. “you’ve heard that he never gives without expecting something in return. All magic comes with a price.”

His sharp eyes caught her mouthing the words along with him and he invaded her space, plucking the little basket from her grip, peering inside it before tossing it carelessly over his shoulder. She gasped and clenched her hands into fists around the edges of her cloak. She didn’t back away but neither did she raise her head to look at him, staring determinedly at the ties of his vest.

“So what do you propose to offer me in trade for protecting your drafty little castle from the forces of the queen?” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder to where her little basket lay forlornly on its side, a few meadow flowers scattered across the glossy marble. “Surely a few wildflowers were not to be the offering? If so, you can just see yourself out now.”

He turned on his heel, making to leave her standing alone in the hall but small fingers caught at his sleeve with an inarticulate noise. He closed his eyes for the briefest of moments and appeared behind her, jerking her back against him by the shoulders. “I don’t deal with time wasters, dearie. Do you have something of worth to offer me or are you going to leave my castle empty handed and return to your father alone?”

“We have little to offer in gold but we have the crops not yet burned by the soldiers and our tradesmen make some of the loveliest goblets and vases in the whole of the Enchanted Forest— eep!“ Her words ended with a choked gasp as one of his hands slid to her stomach, fingers toying with the opening of her cloak. “And- and we have the sweetest salt water taffy in three kingdoms- everyone says.”

“How disappointing,” he sighed, the hair by her ear tickling his lips in the small gust of wind. “If you’ve nothing of real value to offer then I really don’t have any reason to-“

“Wait!” she cried, fishing beneath her the tie of her cloak and pulling sharply at a delicate golden chain hidden beneath the demure neck of her dress. “What about this?”

The pendant was exquisitely wrought, pure gold with a single pearl set in it. It dangled tantalizingly from her hand and he watched the gold glint in the torchlight for a few moments before pushing the trinket back toward her, enfolding her hand in his own.

“Keep your bauble, dearie. I’ve no use for women’s jewelry that I can’t make up myself.” Her hand drew back to her chest and he released it to drop his hand back to her stomach.

“I don’t understand. I have nothing else to give you, Dark One.” The defeat was palpable in her voice, her posture as she fell slightly back against his chest. It was delicious. She smelled of vanilla and she needed his assistance. Like a fine wine drunk on an empty stomach, the situation left him a bit unsteady and overwhelmed.

“I’m sure there is another arrangement we can make?” he murmured, finally slipping his hand between the open sides of her cloak to rest against her ribs. The heat of her through the fabric of her dress made him want to press himself entirely against her back but he refrained. If he overwhelmed her at this early stage she may still run from him. He couldn’t have that. “Isn’t there anything you can think of that I might… want?”

Her breath caught as his hand slowly slipped upward finding one small breast and cupping it in his palm. “I- I can’t. What do you-“

“Think about it, dearie. Is it worth it to have come all this way only to go back to your home, your people without a single weapon to defend them? Imagine how very disappointed your dear father would be if you looked him in the eye and told him that you could have done more.”

He drew the sharp nail of his thumb across the top of her breast, drawing a shuddering gasp from her. It took only the space of a few minutes for her decision to become clear. Slowly, haltingly she leaned back against him, her head dropping again. He felt her begin to quake ever so subtly in his hold and had to remind himself that this was only a game. He pulled her tight against him and pressed his nose into her hair, burrowing into the warm hollow behind her ear where her scent mixed with the vanilla she had dabbed there to make his mouth water.

“So, dearie, do we have a deal?” But he knew he had her. The hand not carefully kneading her breast slipped along the silken ribbons that kept the pretty white bodice of her gown closed and tugged at one until the tight bow began to slip. He was ready to move this little game along now, to tear this pretty costume off her and lose himself in the wonderful woman inside it.

“I-…. Yes, I will give you what you ask,” her whispered words were the sweetest his ears had ever heard.

He tightened his hold on her, slipping an arm about her waist to lift her entirely off the ground. Her hands clutched at the sleeve of his shirt as he waved the doors to the dining hall open before them and shut behind. The bedrooms, his or hers, any bedroom, was much too far away. The enormous oaken table that commanded the room would do quite nicely in the absence of soft sheets and cradling down. 

“Excellent choice, dearie,” he purred as he set her back on her feet, pressed between himself and the edge of the tall, ornate table. “When all is said and done, you shall have such weapons at your disposal as the queen has never stretched her small mind to dream up. But now…”

His hand between her shoulder blades encouraged her to lean forward until she was bent over the cool wood, plump little ass pressed deliciously against his cock. He growled when she turned her head and strained her neck to look at him, her petal pink lips parted with her gusty little breaths. Her skin teased his fingertips where they grazed the neckline of her dress and he dug his nails there before trailing them straight down the center of her spine. He wanted nothing more than to press just that bit harder to draw blood and mark her, suckle at the little wounds and taste her soul in every drop. But that was not this game. This was the careful dance between pushing and patience, the knife-edge between anticipation and fear. If the monster pressed too fast or too eagerly, the young maiden would run screeching into the afternoon light and be lost to him. It was left to him to make the situation, stacked as it was in his favor, seem like the last- but certainly not the most distasteful- resort. 

Her head dropped back to the table with a whimper as he placed a hand at either side of her ribcage and dragged both downward hard enough to fray the delicate cotton beneath them. He growled low in his throat as her spine arched and drove her hips back toward him and he knew he had to have her soon or he would ruin the game as well as one of his favorite pairs of trousers. Stepping back only long enough to slip his hands under her light summer skirt, he drew her drawers down over her hips and let them fall to the ground, encouraging her to step out of them and spread her feet. The skirt he quickly flipped up over her back and hissed between his teeth as she was finally revealed to him, the smooth pale flesh of her ass giving way to neatly trimmed brown curls. His hand followed his eyes as they tracked down over this newly revealed skin, soft and fair and entirely perfect. Slipping one hand down between them he used the fingers of one hand to tenderly draw apart her swollen lips, fascinated by the sight of gooseflesh rippling across her as a result of the cool air. She was dewing up beautifully and he’d hardly touched her yet.

“Make yourself comfortable, dearie. This will be a much better experience for you if you don’t end it with a crick in your pretty neck.” His usual impish titter had dropped in pitch, taking on a rougher timbre as he slipped a single finger through the slickness of her body. 

He watched her draw one arm up to rest her brow against her forearm and press the fingers of her other hand against her mouth. The muscles in her legs twitched as he stroked the finger over and around her clit, gentle, teasing brushes of his finger meant to excite and relax her. When her hips twitched down in an attempt to force more pressure from him, he took it as a sign that she was ready for him. His trousers were discarded with a thought and he was free to step against her, feeling her legs framing his and her sweet little spot of wetness slicking the base of his cock as he fit himself against her. He flinched instinctually when she did, her legs clamping down around him and her knuckles whitening against her mouth. He was worriedly confused for the barest of moments and almost made to pull away. But, ah. His Belle was going to play this through to the end. The tremor that ran through him was as purely animal as the urges that made him want to devour her here and now.

“You're an innocent, aren’t you?” he leaned down over her, one hand drawing idle circles on her flank while the other took his weight on the glossy tabletop beside her. “Oh, what a… delightful surprise. Such a brave little thing you are, to offer your maidenhood to a monster.”

The fingers (usually drenched in dark polish and intricate silver rings) left marks on her skin, a line of half moon indents on her porcelain chin when she made to speak. “Will it… hurt terribly?”

“Not terrible at all, sweetling. I may be a monster but I know better than to abuse such a gift when it falls into my hands.” He drew his hips back and pushed them forward again, struggling not to grind up into her when the silky skin of her inner lips kissed his tip. She was drenched now, her juices slicking them both and doing away with any concerns of hurting her. “Just relax, my pretty thing.”

Legs widening again, she shut her eyes and swallowed audibly, sinking down onto the wood beneath her and tilting her hips back in a silent offer. The kiss he pressed to her shoulder as he pushed himself away from her was as thoughtless as breathing, the game momentarily swept aside in his swelling sense of amazement. If it was possible for The Dark One to love, he might worry about losing his heart to this woman. He reached under her to guide himself to her entrance and pressed ever so slowly inside, stopping only when her hips rested snugly against the plane of his own. Gods she was tight. Hot and wet and gloriously tight. 

“Oh, gods, you’re…It feels so odd.”” she panted huskily, dark glazed eyes flicking up at him beneath her thick lashes.

He grunted when she began to move her hips, twisting them left and right and squeezing him tight with the fist of her inner muscles. He wasted no time in setting his hips to a steady rolling motion, lightly holding her hips to encourage her to push back onto him. She took the direction well, bucking hesitantly back against him. The fabric of her dress slipped against the polished tabletop leaving her unable to do much more than write in place as he teased her with short, sharp thrusts. The needy keen that finally forced it’s way out of her was all the reason he needed to put a hand on her shoulder and begin pulling her down into his thrusts, growling when she clenched around him again. Her breath sped up, little breathy noises interspersed with inarticulate words. Her curls bounced around her head as he drove into her harder and bit his tongue to diminish the tingling feeling that spoke of an approaching orgasm. 

“How do you feel, Belle? Are you close?” He needed to hear it from her, from the fictional woman or the true one, he couldn’t care less. He just needed her voice in his ears while he was buried inside her.

“I… I don’t know. I- oh!” She fairly leaped up off the surface of the table when his fingers caught her swollen clit between them, pressing and rubbing and pinching until she sobbed her pleasure. 

“Oooh, yes you are, dearie. You’re going to come for me. You’re going to come for the Dark One.” He was losing his control, pounding into her so brutally that his back ached but nothing in this world or any other could stop him from shoving himself as deep into her as he could. “Do it, dearie. Come for me. Do it now!”

He jerked her back onto him while pinching her slippery clit between his thumb and forefinger and nearly shouted when she clamped down on him like a vice, her sweet voice rising in a scream that echoed all around them in the cavernous room. Her back arched sharply, half raising her torso off the table and he swore harshly, his thrusts growing unsteady and shallow as he let her fluttering walls pull him over the edge. His palms slipped when he tried to support some of his weight on the table. A conjured armchair seemed just the thing and he collapsed into it with a sigh. Belle took a deep breath that she released on a groan as she stretched her back like a cat. When she flipped onto her back to look at him with heavy-lidded eyes, he twitched a finger at her calling her to his lap. She came with an indulgent roll of her eyes and settled across his thighs, legs hooked over the arm of the chair. 

“I can see that telling you some of my secret fantasies may have been one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.” His hand skimmed up the outside of her thigh and settled on the smooth pliant muscle there. She was already half drowsing against his shoulder, the lazy little harlot. He smiled fondly as he settled back into the cushions of the chair. The decision to take on an apprentice had been one he’d toyed with for years, always sure that somehow or other it would go badly. They would steal his power or his secrets or would be a waste of his considerable talent and efforts. 

He brushed his knuckles against the fabric of her skirt and smiled stupidly. Belle had been everything he could have hoped for and more. Her talent and passion were obvious to him almost immediately, her attention to detail and voracity for knowledge intoxicated him at every turn as he struggled to have a new assignment to place before her with each one that she breezed through. Belle was…. amazing. His heart fluttered as she snuggled sleepily into the crook of his neck and murmured something, seeming perfectly content to be held close while she slept. A hazy thought returned to his mind and he frowned. If it was possible for The Dark One to love... Outside the windows, the sun was setting bright and fiery red and he watched it sinking toward the horizon while her soft breath evened out into that of sleep. As she shifted again and one of her legs began to slip from the arm of the chair, he knew. He reached out and gathered her legs close and dropped his face to rest his cheek against her hair. He loved her. The monster loved his young maid. And now that he loved her, he would lose her.


	5. Her Conclusion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Belle discovers something blooming inside herself. Something as delicate and flickering as a small flame. Something that she decides to snuff out, before it can grow large enough to send everything she’s working for to shambles. It sounds simple enough on paper….

Rumplestiltskin sighed and dropped his scroll on the cushion at his side. He’d been staring at the same three words of the same sentence for near an hour with no comprehension at all of what he’d read. His thoughts had gone from the perfectly crisp black color of the ink to the nearly matching shade of black kohl that Belle carefully lined her eyes with each morning and he was lost to his musings of her soft skin and her hungry eyes and her greedy little body suckling at him. She was beautiful. He was sure it was the first thing most people who weren’t blind noticed about her. Fair and dark, luscious and petite, vivid and filthy. Of course, it wasn’t all fun and fucking, but watching her work was nearly as satisfying. There were times where he set her to a spell or potion and she was all but lost to the world until he appeared at her elbow with food and a reminder to sleep. And her work was impeccable! Tidy and clear and marvelously inventive. Not only did she understand the work, she understood how to improve upon it. She was quick, clever, had a biting sense of humor and gods above did she know how to leave him feeling as though there weren’t a bone in his body not melted into a puddle when she finished with him. She was worlds away from what he deserved so really, it was inevitable that he would love her, wasn’t it?

He frowned and pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. There was that word again, love. For as twisted and cruel as his past with the fairer sex was, he expected he must love her. His sham of a marriage had been nothing like as content and close as his interactions in the castle with Belle and Cora’s betrayal still ached. And of course, Bae. Loving Belle would complicate things, would make him soft and unfocused when he needed his wits about him. If he did love her. Did he love her? If love was concern for her wellbeing on those days where she forgot to eat, determination to draw out the natural talent she had and mold it into a something incredible. If thinking of her while he spun to forget other things was love. If wanting to hold her after they’d fucked on yet another uncomfortable piece of furniture and see her fall asleep against his shoulder was love. Either way, he was in a damned lot of trouble.

She appeared then, as if summoned by his very thoughts of her, strutting through the aisles of his library as though it were her own. She was drenched in black, as per usual, the ghostly pallor of her skin nearly shining in the dust-thickened air. He had the perfect vantage point, half hidden behind the drapes and wearing nearly the same shade of red silk as the bench he sat upon. That fact didn’t grate upon his nerves nearly as much as it might have were he not so focused upon the woman before him. She raised one delicate hand and ran her fingers across the spines of the books, not seeming to be searching for anything in particular, just wishing to touch a few of her beloved volumes. 

He sat perfectly still and watched as she stretched up onto her toes and crooked a finger at a black book just out of her reach. It hopped into her waiting grasp and she opened it to flip aimlessly through the pages. For a moment, Rumplestiltskin found himself struck with the strongest urge to approach her and wrap her up in his arms, stroke his fingers from her shoulders to her elbows then rest his chin on her shoulder and see what it was she was reading. He could just picture the corner of her mouth turning up, perfectly plump lips tantalizing him when she turned her head to look at him. He would press a kiss to her cheek and nuzzle the peach-fuzz hair just in front of her ear. It was a domestic thought, full of the kind of warmth and easy touches he’d never experienced before. And it terrified him. This was his apprentice, not his lover. Well, yes, alright, she was his lover as well, but the work came first and the play second. He could not have these thoughts clouding his mind whenever she entered the same room. 

It became apparent that she knew he was watching her when she bent forward to browse a low shelf, spine straight and hair slipping over her shoulder as she swayed gently on the spot. The hem of her dress rose slightly to reveal her bare feet and her pert little ass nearly made his mouth water as he traced the swishing of her skirt over it. He could nearly feel her pressed against him already, twitching those devilish hips until he couldn't help but grab her with both hands and—

Her eyes twinkled at him over her shoulder and he realized that that was exactly what she wanted. She wanted him to press her up against the bookshelf and take her from behind, wanted him to press so hard into her that her slim little hips bruised against the unforgiving wood. And even though parts of him screamed for that, beat with burning fists against the sides of his skull to get him to move, to fuck her the way they both wanted- he couldn’t do that. He couldn’t. Not when all he wanted in the world was to press his lips to the dewy soft skin of her temple. Not when his arms nearly ached to hold her. He didn’t want to fuck her. He wanted to feel her.

******

In the space between when Belle had begun to stand up and when she turned to face the window, he was gone. She sighed and slumped into a nearby armchair, throwing her legs over one arm and summoning a book across the room. She’d thought for sure that he would take the bait when his fingers started to tighten into fists. He’d been acting so odd lately. He hardly ever tried to distract her while she was working, he hadn’t played a silly prank on her in nearly a week and he only looked at her now when she looked away. Very odd. If she weren’t so assured by the way that simply drawing air into her lungs could turn him on, she might believe he were growing tired of her. Though what he lost in scathing sarcasm and wickedness he seemed to have gained in fidgeting and hesitant touches when they fucked. It was…. unnerving to say the least. Almost……. fond? Perhaps he’d grown ill or stupidly ingested one of his own potions. Perhaps it would soon run its course and he would be back to his prancing, preening, ridiculous self. Belle didn’t like a mystery that refused to be solved. It made her mind itch and tickle at her until she could find the answer. So she shoved the thoughts aside and opened the book to the page she’d marked. 

It was a deliciously filthy little novel that she’d discovered on a rainy day and decided to keep for the future. A gallant but simple hero out gallivanting across the countryside while his sweet princess was wooed by his morally ambiguous uncle, heavy on adventure and steamy sex, light on much else. She’d toyed with the idea of straddling her good master’s lap and reading passages to him aloud while she denied him any further contact, until he thought he would simply burst. Her face split into a grin at the thought. He would surely get bored with avoiding her soon, and then she could torture him at her leisure. But for now she put all thoughts of plotting out of her mind and began to read, her fingers stroking a winding, lazy path up her leg where it was revealed by the slit in her skirt. If her real lover wouldn’t see to her, she would simply have to look to the fictional man to scratch her itch. 

She slipped one hand into her bodice and scraped her thumbnail over a nipple. The library rang with her gasp and she laughed softly, wickedly pleased with her own show. She hoped Rumplestiltskin’s voyeuristic tendencies had gotten the best of him and he’d decided to peek in on her from his office. Forcing him to admit that he couldn’t resist the sight of her before she let him fuck her would certainly be the highlight of her day, but unless he appeared this was about her. So she focused on the scene unraveling between the duke and the princess. He’d invited her to his estate for a friendly dinner in the absence of her love, never suspecting that she had planned her seduction as precisely as he had. Belle allowed herself to fall into the scene, imagining the duke’s rough tone as he whispered in the princess’s ear about the benefit his experience would bring to the throne—when she married his nephew. She tipped her head to the side when the duke trailed his mouth over the princesses throat, shivering with the memory of hot breath and unshaven skin dragging against her. Her second hand, having been freed by a handy levitation spell, began to slip down to the opening of her skirt. Her fingers slipped easily between her folds and she sighed as she continued to read. The shifting image of the duke in her head had begun to solidify behind her eyes, his touch becoming more solid and his voice rumbling in her ears. Her head tipped back as she bit her lip and imagined the duke leaning over her, pressing his fingers as deeply into her as possible while he whispered filth in her ear. She imagined him slipping his arm about her waist, pulling her lower on the seat of the armchair until her hips were close enough for him to free himself from his breeches and replace his fingers with his cock after licking the digits clean. The book fell to the floor forgotten as she shut her eyes and concentrated on the fantasy. Warm hands clutched at her hips and Belle moaned throatily, twitching upward when he guided her into his thrusts. The burn of her corset restricting her breath combined with the gust of hot breath in her ear as he leaned closer and closed his teeth around the skin of her shoulder, jaw tightening with each upward push into her body. 

“There, love, that’s perfect,” he groaned, pressing a kiss just behind her ear. His hands clutched the arms of the chair around her body, one arm sliding beneath her thigh to push her legs wider. “Gods, you feel wonderful. And you taste even better, do you know that? You taste like the stuff of dreams and if I could I’d keep you always on my tongue.”

“Fuck,” she whimpered, sucking in a breath when his knuckles grazed her clit. She was so close it made her dizzy, though that may have been the lack of oxygen.

“You’re lovely like this, Belle. Just like this. Flushed and soft and desperate. I don’t think there’s much in the world that’s as satisfying as this. Christ, Belle, do you know how fucking beautiful you are?” 

He’d slowed his pace while he spoke, drawing out each stroke and lingering over them until she protested wordlessly and tightened around him. 

“So impatient,” he chuckled, though his breathlessness gave away his own eagerness. “Yes, alright, I’ll give you what you want, don’t worry.”

And he did. He pulled away and anchored her against the seat of the chair and fucked her with fast, hard thrusts until her spine stiffened and stars exploded behind her eyes. She pressed the back of her hand to her mouth, suddenly shy of the cavernous room carrying her voice through the castle as she rode out the waves of her orgasm. Even as her body began to feel heavy and drowsy, Belle found herself uneasy. She had begun this fantasy with her ruthless duke but ended it with someone entirely different. Someone more familiar. Too late, she realized that the piercing blue eyes and oiled hair of her imagined duke had given way to unruly curls and a sharp, yellowed smile. The hands that had clenched tight around handfuls of her skirt had long ragged nails and glittered faintly in the sunlight. The eyes riveted to her face while she strove against him were the same manic gaze that followed her across the room not half an hour ago. 

She jerked her fingers from her body as if they’d burned her, horror following the realization that she’d just got herself off to the idea of the man she was apprenticed to. The room was suddenly too bright and she pushed her skirt down and stood on shaking legs to escape her own mistake. This had never happened. This was not supposed to happen. This was verging on dangerous territory and Belle berated herself for it. Sex was all well and good but that was all it was between them. What kind of stupid little girl lusted after her teacher? what kind of stupid little girl lusted after _Rumplestiltskin?!_ His smile could make a child break down in hysterics and his bouts of surly attitude were hardly worth the sex… well, no, there was quite a lot that she would trade for that sex. She would even consider a firstborn or two. But mind-blowing orgasms aside, this was about so much more than that. This was about the skills he had to share, and the knowledge she could take away from their arrangement to assure that she was as ready to face the world on her own as she could be. There would be no father to sell her in marriage, no stoic little princeling to watch her with eyes that appraised her as a possession and certainly no snotnosed little children tugging at her skirts, demanding her energy and attention. Even the thought of so much tying her to any place made her heart squeeze in her chest.

No, she decided, nothing would keep her from her life, from her adventures and her freedom. Not family duty, not “fate”, not… whatever may be happening here. A plan began to form in her mind, a way to force this situation back onto steady ground and into her control. Belle squared her shoulders and raised her eyes to the ceiling, wondering how long it would be before Rumplestiltskin decided to retreat to his chambers.


	6. His Defeat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He knew he could not hold her in thrall in his empty castle forever. She was a wild thing desperate to taste the world and she’d never pretended otherwise. Why, then, did it steal his breath away to see his prediction realized?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so, I have been AWOL for roughly a year and then this chapter came pouring out of me a few nights ago and I'm really happy about that because I thought my muse had just keeled over and died or something. Next chapter will be the last, though there may be some little extras down the road because this series was a lot of fun to write.
> 
> Thanks to my dearest loopymoony for looking this over for me and helping me rework the ending. She's a starfish princess fairy and she is one of my favorite people ever.

Rumplestiltskin sat back and sighed, raising a hand to scratch at his scalp. The fire had burned low and the coals smoldering in the grate left his eyes aching from the strain of seeing through the gloom. The piles of scrolls scattered across his desktop suddenly seemed so much less appealing than the call of his featherbed. The work would keep until the morning at least, when he had the chill air seeping through the stone walls to cloak himself in to try to forget the human warmth he lacked. He wondered about that as he stepped out into the corridor, passing torches that lit themselves silently at his approach. Belle had been avoiding him. She’d been slipping through the shadows around him while he pretended not to notice or care. They worked together as well as ever, though the silences were longer and strained where they used to be filled with her tuneless humming or laughter. But as soon as she left the laboratory, she was gone again. Three days at least since they’d had a conversation about anything except dicing ingredients properly or the correct temperature at which to let this or that potion simmer.

 

Perhaps she had finally come to her senses. It wouldn’t be unusual. Many pretty young things before her had decided to reach for power only to find themselves backtracking like mad as soon as they came within reach of his hoary old hands. Some strapping young lad in the village across the lake had no doubt caught her eye. Or perhaps her ambition had got the better of her and she’d gone scrying across the land for the prettiest silk-clad prince around and locked her claws into him. Well, second prettiest now that he’d set Charming on the path to twue wuv. It was a pity, though. She’d made it farther than any one of his less determined apprentices, probably all combined, and she had the flair for magic that so many hopeful sorcerers lacked. But the calls of youth and beauty had as strong a pull as power, he imagined. He would tear up the contract they’d made if she asked and he would let her go. He’d always known this would have an end. Belle was destined to go so much further than his dusty old castle and he could tell himself he was content with just the knowledge that he’d helped to begin her on the path to the great things awaiting her. Never mind the way his heart clenched at the thought of seeing her go.

 

The crackle of his fireplace as he stepped into his bedchamber was not surprising, nor were the candles burning on the low table in the center of the room. He kicked off his heeled boots with a bit of magic and flexed his sore toes against the cold stone floor. The woman tucked away in his bed was somewhat unexpected. Even in his advanced age, he knew that was not the way he’d left things that morning. Especially not the bit about the froth of white lace and linen that clung to her curves as she sat up. Or the bit about her rosy nipples peeking out at him through the thin fabric. Or the bit about her fair skin framed by the pitch black pillows piled at the head of his bed.

 

“Well, at least I shan’t need to worry about warming the blankets.” He approached carefully, nearly tiptoeing around the unknown mood in the room. He’d known enough women to know never to assume safety. She could be angry enough to spit and still look intent on giving him the best bedding of his life. Females were a treacherous lot.

 

“Good evening, Rumplestiltskin.” She bobbed her head respectfully and fidgeted with the edging of her robe. “I hope this does not displease you. I could leave if you would prefer to be alone.”

 

Aaaah, so it was another game. The corners of his mouth stretched up into a grin as he waved his hand carelessly at the doors, which swung silently shut behind him and slipping into the skin of this game they’d played so often with little effort.

 

“No, no, no.” He approached the bed and wagged a finger at her, pleased when she managed to keep from smiling. “You stay right where you are, dearie. I quite like the look of you right there. But, ah, why are you here?”

 

 “I’m… I’m here… because…” Her eyes fluttered confusedly between her nightgown, the empty stretch of mattress beside her before finally settling on the lowest part of his body that she could see, his knees. “I’m afraid I don’t understand what you’re asking.”

 

He tittered and steepled his fingers under his chin, delighted once again to discover just what a talented little actress he had in his company. “No, I’m afraid you don’t. You see, I know what you are doing here. What I want to know is what you’re still doing _here_.”

 

He threw his arms wide to indicate the castle and was pleased when she met his gaze, looking startled.

 

“What do you-“

 

“Why haven’t you gone skipping off home, back to your father and your underwhelming fiancé and all his various “discreet” conquests?” He paced as he spoke and watched her struggle to force down her anger, hands apparently folded demurely in her lap except that he could see the places where her fingernails dug into her palms. She’d told him offhandedly one afternoon about the dimwitted fool of a knight her father had tried to force her to wed and how she’d scared the boy off with a promise of swift castration if he attempted to press his suit. Any challenge he could present to her carefully crafted character in their games only served to make the reward that much better.

 

This Belle was meek and innocent and would never raise her voice to The Dark One. She was a pale, quivering shadow compared to the vibrant woman he knew and he wondered if Belle did that on purpose. Whether she chose to play at being boring like the simpering girls at court or if she ever wondered what it would be like to be as this version of herself. Whether she ever longed the simplicity of exactly what he’d teased her about: an easy life with a man who would only expect her to look lovely and provide him with healthy sons. He was confident that she did not want it as she was now, but as he watched her breath slowly in and out, a delicate white shock in the center of his massive, dark bed, he wondered whether she slipped into the skin of this waifish creation because she wished to be more like her. The derisive snort that thought drew brought her eyes back to his with a questioning quirk of her brow but he shook his head minutely and she slipped easily back into character again. If she had wanted that from the world- from him- she would have asked, and so far she had asked for nothing from him but to be exactly who they were. Aside from these little games, of course.

 

“I cannot go back on my word. My people depend on it. My father and-“

 

“Your people _did_ depend on you, yes. But you have fulfilled that obligation.” He pinched his fingers together in the air and mimicked scratching a quill across a piece of parchment. She sat quietly and watched him, unsure of where he meant to lead her but willing to play along until she did. “Our bargain was for a one time romp and nothing further, dearie. And yet, you’ve remained in my domain when you could have gladly fled and put all memory of our time together to rest. I find myself curious as to why that is. Would you care to enlighten me?”

 

He saw the realization click into place behind her eyes and fought the urge to clap for her quick mind as she pushed the coverlet away and drew her knees to her chest.

 

“I… I don’t know….” she blushed prettily and stared hard at the place where her toes peeped out from under the hem of her gown and did not speak again.

 

“Well, if you’re going to lie to me, I see no reason to continue the conversation further.” He spun about to leave and was brought up short when her little fingers gripped his sleeve just below his elbow. He turned his head to find her leaning forward on her knees, supporting her weight on her free hand and looking up at him like a lost little lamb. “Tell me why you are here.”

 

Her hand relaxed from his sleeve and she sat back again, hands clenched against her thighs. When she spoke her words came begrudgingly and he watched the blush spread down her neck to the tops of her breasts. “Because I didn’t think… _it_ was going to be that way. I thought… You’re not what they said you would be.”

 

He tutted and turned to face her fully again, stepping toward the bed until his knees pressed against the edge of the mattress. “Now, that’s another lie, isn’t it dearie? I am _exactly_ what they said I would be, likely down to the size and shape of my pinky toes. No one has mislead you about what you would find when you came here. So the questions remains, why are you here?”

 

Again, the answer seemed to be dragged from her as a fish from a deep lake but answer she did, walking herself slowly toward him on her knees and rising shakily up before him. “Because you make me want to feel… things, and do things and I don’t know if that will happen again if I leave here.”

 

He’d managed to remain aloof for long enough to surprise even himself but these words brought his attention immediately to the erection straining against the crotch of his pants and the way her entire body was outlined by the soft light through the sheer fabric she wore. With the tiniest amount of effort, that fabric would shred beneath his claws but that was not the aim here. If he frightened his little lamb away before she was really his, the game was over and he did not intend to lose. Instead he snaked out an arm and jerked her against him, the other hand slipping up the nape of her neck and twisting into the roots of her hair. He leaned into her, curling his spine forward so that she had to arch back and press her breasts up toward his face. Her breath caught in her throat when he ghosted a kiss across the sweet valley of her cleavage but he only allowed himself one or two before he raised his head again and fixed her with a hard gaze.

 

“Tell me why you’re here,” he demanded quietly and felt her shudder against him.

 

Her face was flushed, eyes dilated and lips parted as she looked back at him and it was tempting to bite the words from her mouth as she said them, but that would not be winning and he was doggedly determined to win here. “I want you, Rumplestiltskin.”

 

They were lying tangled on the bed so quickly that he couldn’t be sure neither of them had called on the aid of magic but as Belle parted her legs beneath him, he found he couldn’t care all that much either. His left hand swept up under the hem of her gown and found her soaked, dragging his fingers teasingly through her damp curls a few times until she sighed. With a thought, their clothing vanished and he was free to settle against her, making contact with her skin anywhere he could. His fingers set to work plucking and rubbing at her clit and he claimed her mouth in the bruising kiss, drinking down the high, soughing sounds she made. Her hands moved restlessly from his back to the sheets at her sides to his hair, fingers digging into his scalp as she canted her hips up into his touch. When she whispered a quiet, desperate plea into his ear he growled like an animal and sank himself as deep into her body as he could manage.

 

He raised himself up onto his elbows, caging her with his arms and began a punishing rhythm that she matched thrust for thrust. Belle raised her legs to press her feet against his buttocks, pressing him closer as her hands wandered across his shoulders and chest. Rumplestiltskin reached down to hitch her leg higher and scattered stinging little bites across her collarbones, loving the sound of her panted breath and the feel of her hips tilting up to meet him. His mouth drifted up to her neck from her chest and he found himself desperate to bite her there, to mark her up high where none of her tarty little dresses could hope to hide the evidence of his presence on her. The spasm of her inner muscles when he sank his teeth into her skin drew a groan from him and he soothed the bite with a kiss, nuzzling his mouth back and forth over the spot as she clutched at his back and gasped her pleasure against his hair. The soft warmth of her neck drew him in, the smell of her skin and her perfume filling his nose so that he wanted to wear a bouquet of it, carry a nosegay made of her pillowcase to keep the scent with him throughout the day. His lips moved up her neck to her jaw and he paused there, nose pressed to her cheek, feeling her eye lashed flutter against his forehead and feeling her beginning to grow frantic beneath him. He, quite to the contrary, was happy to slow his pace and savor her here. The muscles of her legs were clenched tight and he wanted to massage the tension out of them, tell her to relax and let him take care of her. Her breasts pressed against his chest with every breath she took and much as he wanted to take them into his mouth, there was something he wanted more. Her teeth sank into her lower lip and he leaned slightly away to be able to watch her face. Her eyes were screwed tight shut and her fingers were twitching against his upper arms, her grip tight enough to bruise were he able to bruise. As he watched, her eyes slid open and the tip of her tongue peeked out over her lips, drawing his attention down to her mouth. Her lips were swollen from his harsh kisses and he found himself leaning down to lick them as she had just done, trying to make up for his brutishness by pressing whisper soft kisses to her chin, her nose, her cheeks. She wouldn’t allow him to settle anywhere and bit at his lips instead, bringing back some of his sense of urgency.

 

“Harder, Rum,” she groaned and he obliged, eye still riveted to her even as he knew he would not be able to last much longer. Belle glanced up at him and he did not recognize the expression she wore before she dragged him down into a ragged kiss, something like fear but of what? He moaned softly as she writhed beneath him and reached down to catch her clit between his fingers again. She keened into his mouth and hugged him tightly around the shoulders as her back stiffened. He whispered roughly in her ear, murmuring encouragement and praise, his words blurring together in his mind until he almost didn’t understand what he was saying as his hips stuttered to a halt. He called out her name, following her over the edge and slumped down onto his forearms, holding his weight enough to keep from crushing her. He pressed lazy kisses to her shoulder and waited for her breath to grow level again, growing concerned when her chest continued to heave beneath him. Her eyes were practically snapping when he looked up at her and for a moment he was startled to see her so angry. Just a moment, of course, until the things he had allowed to come tumbling out in the heat of his orgasm came back to him.

 

“Ah.” How incredibly clumsy of him to murmur the truth of his love to this woman as he fucked her, like a callow boy. Regina would laugh herself sick if she heard about such a foolish mistake but he found he could not feel the shame he ought. Even as she pushed him away with hard hands and cold eyes, he knew he had only succumbed to the inevitable. He was always going to fall in love with her and he was always going to tell her and it was always going to slip through his fingers eventually. He watched her scuttle gracelessly off the bed and stride quickly away, black cloth materializing over her body until she was entirely covered head to foot and felt safe enough to turn and confront him, armored in whalebone and leather and hatred.

 

“This was never supposed to happen. This was not the arrangement, you bastard!” She raked her fingers through her hair and paced toward the window, looking out onto the darkened grounds while he sat wearily in the center of the bed, gazing down at his upturned palms. “Well? Don’t you have any clever retort for me? Some bit of banter that will make this all better? _Don’t you always have something to say?”_

 

She turned to face him again, fingers curling and uncurling at her sides as if she’d like to wrap them around his throat.

 

“I know this wasn’t the arrangement, pet, but I can’t help it now. I never stood a chance, not from the first day you sauntered across my threshold and made it clear you had no intention of leaving until you got what you wanted.”

 

She made a noise of sheer disgust and strode away from the window, heels clicking across the stone floor until she stood in front of him again. She leaned forward until their eyes were on the same level. “I don’t _want_ this,” she hissed. “I don’t want _you_.”

 

“I know,” he replied sadly.

 

His quiet acceptance of her harsh words only seemed to infuriate her further and she whirled to the nearest table, sending it crashing to the floor and scattering the various trinkets it had housed. She tore down the curtains from the side of the four-poster bed and set the fabric on fire, dropping it to the floor and approaching the window again. Her fist shattered a pane of glass and he was startled to see blood dripping down her wrist into her sleeve. She clenched her hand and studied her damaged knuckles clinically but made no attempt to heal her torn skin. The only sound for several long minutes was the curtain smoldering down into a pile of ash and her harsh breathing.

 

“Belle, I don’t know what I can do to make this any better,” he whispered and she turned, looking him over as he sat hunched and miserable and naked before her.

 

“There’s nothing you can do,” she stood tall as she said it, chin thrust forward and shoulders back. “But there’s something I can do.”

 

And with that, she swept out of the room without a backward glance at him. He listened to the swish of her skirts fading down the corridor before he stood and went to the window. A soft summer breeze whistled through the broken windowpane and Rumplestiltskin watched a drop of Belle’s blood sliding its lazy way down toward the wooden frame. He didn’t know how long he stood there before exhaustion drew him back to his bed and he crashed down into blessedly dreamless sleep.

 

He’d woken as the sun stretched warming tendrils over the land and dressed distractedly, finding once he was done that he’d slipped his shirt on backwards and that his boots did not match. Spinning proved to be impossible and he paced aimlessly for a while before deciding to go to his workroom and dabble with some new potions to pass the time. Perhaps it would be easier for her to join him there, to stride proudly in in her spiked heels and pepper him with insults until their tentative balance was restored. He swore to the quiet morning air that he wouldn’t try to touch her again unless she initiated it. He would play the role she required of him if it meant that he could keep her close. After spending the morning amusing himself with various potions, he wandered downstairs again to find the dining room still empty, no tea in the pot or lunch set out on the table and the curtains still shut tight. He sat down at his wheel and spun haltingly for a time, pausing every now and again to listen for the sound of footsteps.

 

It wasn’t until late that evening when he discovered that she had gone. Sneaking up to her room in the gathering gloom, he’d found the door to her bedchamber open, the room beyond it empty. The piles of glittering, silky dresses, the stacks of books that had covered the floor like a small paper city, the small bird she’d charmed out of his gold thread to sing her bawdy barroom songs when she couldn’t sleep. All of it gone, along with his apprentice. Her solution was exactly what he had always expected to happen. He knew he could not hold her in thrall in his empty castle forever. She was a wild thing desperate to taste the world and she’d never pretended otherwise. Why, then, did it steal his breath away to see his prediction realized?

 

He picked out several dusty bottles of liquor from the deepest shelves in his stores (something ancient and glowing whose labels had long since flaked away and whose origin he could not recall) and set to trying to numb the hollow ache in his chest. The tea set they’d used together drew his attention and he lifted the teacup she’d knocked carelessly off the table one afternoon while he got her off with his mouth. He remembered the heat of the afternoon sun on his back and the heat of her under his mouth and how she had laughed when she discovered the chip in the rim of the cup later. She’d laughed harder when he made his preference for the cup plain by using it daily. He sloshed a measure of drink into thin bone china and hefted the pot in his hand for a moment before opening his fingers and letting it fall to the floor and shatter. A teacup followed it, and a saucer followed that. Piece by piece the room was deconstructed around him. The lovely rug frayed and blew apart, the curtains shredded, the wood of the furniture warped and melted. The glass doors of the display cabinet that took up one wall of the room flew open and he amused himself with shooting the objects within at a glittering target summoned from the air. His aim steadily worsened as he drank more but the sounds of destruction were soothing nonetheless.

 

When nothing remained in one piece in the room beyond the room itself, he stood from his chair with some difficulty, poured the last few mouthfuls of the drink into his cup and threw the empty bottle over his shoulder. The stairs presented somewhat of a challenge but seemed safer than accidentally slicing himself in half by materializing halfway inside a wall. Once he’d drained the cup, he righted the table Belle had knocked over and set it gently on top. The wind whistling through the window caught his ear and he stumbled toward it, setting a hand on the cool stone wall to steady himself. Belle’s blood had dried in a wandering web across his window and he traced a finger down one of the lines, studying the way the flakes of red caught in the ridges of his skin. Blood was a very useful substance in practicing magic. It carried the essence of a person, the echo of their soul in every drop, could ensure the absolute protection body and soul. It could also allow complete control over an unsuspecting victim. If she had been thinking clearly, Belle would not have left him with this gift of power. Were she still present he would likely have pointed this out to her in a series of power games in his bed. As the circumstances stood now, though…

 

When the thought occurred to him, he hesitated only a moment to consider. Surely she would not begrudge him this small joy, not if it meant no real change for her. A wave of his hand drew the blood from the glass and whirled it through the air. He watched as the flakes gathered together, becoming liquid again before his eyes and forming into a small, quivering ball about the size of his first fingernail. He raised his hand until the meager pool grazed his skin and shut his eyes to concentrate through the haze of alcohol in his mind. The feel of cool liquid became something flat and hard and he blinked down at the simply cut ruby ring that now graced his right ring finger. The windowpane was whole again and he moved to the bed, eyes still expectantly watching the ring. For a moment there was nothing and he feared he had wasted the only chance he had to be connected to Belle. But then—oh.

 

When it came, it was a shifting, soft collection of her sensations, not what he had expected, really. Occasionally he would catch a whispered thought or a fleeting image that was never an entire picture of the surrounding world. Clothes discarded with a thought, Rumplestiltskin crawled into his bed and stroked a finger over the gem, marveling at the sensation of another’s consciousness seeping into his own. His drunken mind struggled to keep pace with the quick stream of information. He knew she was enjoying the night breeze against her face, he could sense that she was excited about what she was doing and he tasted the phantom tang of salt on his lips. The salty sea breeze, he thought, but then the ring zapped him with her anger and he saw more than felt something swipe across his eyes. Ah. Not the sea, then. She was angry and tired because she had not stopped moving since she left his castle a mere hour after he ruined everything. And then his name appeared at the edge of her mind and he could see it there, hovering insistently at the periphery of her mind in spidery, glittering script. She refused to allow it any nearer and turned her face up toward the sky, counting stars to distract herself instead, as many adventures out there as there were stars in the heaven and she would find them all. There was a tightness in her chest, though, a constricting sadness that sat in her abdomen like a heavy stone grinding at her ribs with every breath she took. Rumplestiltskin groaned and pressed his lips to the ring.

 

“Oh, Belle,” he murmured.

 

It was frustrating as anything he’d ever experienced, knowing that she was hurting the same as he was but that she would not welcome the comfort that he desperately longed to give her. Perhaps it had been a mistake to steal her privacy in this ache but he found that he was just selfish enough to not care. Everything that he had done to this point was to find his son and his plan was so close to slipping into place. Regina would place the curse and Snow White’s daughter would break it. He would find Bae and make up for the betrayal he had allowed his fear to cause and he could not risk the years of manipulation and hard work he’d expended because of his stubborn love. At least this way he could keep an eye on her while she was out in the world soaking up her fill. Perhaps one day her thoughts would turn to the stuffy old castle where she had spent a happy few months learning her trade and she would bend her steps back to him. It was a pleasant lie to tell himself as he succumbed to sleep, lips still shaped to the surface of the glittering, skin-warmed stone. His dreams were full of the murmured words of strange voices and muddled excitement.


End file.
